ted Provinces of the River Plate was such a government; that we might safely acknowledge its independence, without danger of war from Spain, from the allies, or from England; and that, without unconstitutional interference with the executive power, with peculiar fitness, we might express, in an act of appropriation, our sentiments, leaving him to the exercise of a just and responsible discretion. He hoped the committee would adopt the proposition which he had now the honor of presenting to them, after a respectful tender of his acknowledgments for their atten tion and kindness, during, he feared, the tedious period he had been so unprofitably trespassing upon their patience. He offered the following amendment to the bill:

"For one year's salary, and an outfit to a minister to the United Provinces of the Rio de la Plata, the salary to commence, and the outfit to be paid, whenever the President shall deem it expedient to send a minister to the said United Provinces, a sum not exceeding eighteen thousand dollars."

ON THE SEMINOLE WAR.

Speech on the Seminole War, delivered in the House of Repre sentatives, January 1819.

MR. CHAIRMAN:

In rising to address you, sir, on the very interesting subject which now engages the attention of Congress, I must be allowed to say, that all inferences drawn from the course, which it will be my painful duty to take in this discussion, of unfriendliness either to the chief magistrate of the country, or to the illustrious military chieftain, whose operations are under investigation, will be wholly unfounded. Towards that distinguished captain, who shed so much glory on our country, whose renown constitutes so great a portion of its moral property, I never had, I never can have any other feelings than those of the most profound respect, and of the utmost kindness. With him my acquaintance is very limited, but, so far as it has extended, it has been of the most amicable kind. I know, said Mr. C. the motives which have been, and which will again be attributed to me, in regard to the other exalted personage alluded to. They have been and will be unfounded. I have no interest, other than that of seeing the concerns of my country well and happily administered. It is infinitely more gratifying to behold the prosperity of my country advancing by the wisdom of the measures adopted to promote it, than it would be to expose the errors which may be committed, if there be any, in the conduct of its affairs. Mr. C. said, little as had been his experience in pnblic life, it had been sufficient to teach him that the most humble station is surrounded by difficul

ties and embarrassments. Rather than throw obstructions in the way of the president, he would precede him, and pick out those, if he could, which might jostle him in his progress he would sympathize with him in his embarrassments and commisserate with him in his misfortunes. It was true, that it had been his mortification to differ with that gentleman on several occasions. He might be again reluctantly compelled to differ with him; but he would with the utmost sincerity assure the committee that he had formed no resolution, come under no engagements, and that he never would form any resolution, or contract any engagements, for systematic opposition to his administration, or to that of any other chief magistrate.

Mr. Clay begged leave further to premise that the subject under consideration, presented two distinct aspects, susceptible, in his judgment, of the most clear and precise discrimination. The one he would call its foreign, the other its domestic aspect. In regard to the first, he would say, that he approved entirely of the conduct of his government, and that Spain had no cause of complaint. Having violated an important stipulation of the treaty of 1795, that power had justly subjected herself to all the consequences which ensued upon the entry into her dominions, and it belonged not to her to complain of those measures which resulted from her breach of contract; still less had she a right to examine into the considerations connected with the domestic aspect of the subject.

What were the propositions before the committee? The first in order was that reported by the military committee, which asserts the disapprobation of this House, of the proceedings in the trial and execution of Arbuthnot and Ambrister. The second, being the first contained in the proposed ammendment, was the consequence of that disapprobation, and contemplates the passage of a law to prohibit the execution hereafter, of any captive, taken by the army, without the approbation of the president. The third proposition was, that this house disapproves of the forcible seizure of the Spanish posts, as contrary to orders, and in violation of the constitution. The fourth proposition, as the result of the last, is, that a law should pass to prohibit the march of the army of the United States, or any corps of it, into any foreign territory, without the previous authorization of Congress, except it be in fresh pursuit of a defeated enemy. The first and third were general propositions, declaring the sense of the House in regard to the evils pointed out, and the second and fourth proposed the legislative remedies against the recurrence of those evils.

It would be at once perceived, Mr. C. said, by this simple statement of the propositions, that no other censure was proposed against General Jackson himself, than what was merely consequential. His name even did not appear in any one of the resolutions. The legislature of the country, in reviewing the state of the Union, and considering the events which have transpired

since its last meeting, finds that particular occurrences, of the greatest moment, in many respects, had taken place near our southern border. He would add, that the House had not sought, by any officious interference with the duties of the executive, to gain jurisdiction over this matter. The president, in his message at the opening of the session, communicated the very information on which it was proposed to act. He would ask, for what purpose? That we should fold our arms and yield a tacit acquiescence, even if we supposed that information disclosed alarming events, not merely as it regards the peace of the country, but in respect to its constitution and character? Impossible. In communicating these papers, and voluntarily calling the attention of Congress to the subject, the president must himself have intended that we should apply any remedy that we might be able to devise. Having the subject thus regularly and fairly before us, and proposing merely to collect the sense of the House upon certain important transactions which it discloses, with the view to the passage of such laws as may be demanded by the public interest, he repeated, that there was no censure any where, except such as was strictly consequential upon our legislative action. The supposition of every new law, having for its object to prevent the recurrence of evil, is, that something has happened which ought not to have taken place, and no other than this indirect sort of censure would flow from the resolutions before the committee.

Having thus given his view of the nature and character of the propositions under consideration, Mr. C. said he was far from intimating, that it was not his purpose to go into a full, a free, and a thorough investigation of the facts, and of the principles of law, public, municipal, and constitutional, involved in them. And, whilst he trusted he should speak with the decorum due to the distinguished officers of the government, whose proceedings were to be examined, he should exercise the independence which belonged to him as a representative of the people, in freely and fully submitting his sentiments.

In noticing the painful incidents of this war, it was impossible not to inquire into its origin. He feared that it would be found to be the famous treaty of Fort Jackson, concluded in August, 1814; and he asked the indulgence of the chairman, that the clerk might read certain parts of that treaty. (The clerk having read as requested, Mr. C. proceeded.) He had never perused this instrument until within a few days past, and he had read it with the deepest mortification and regret. A more dictatorial spirit he had never seen displayed in any instrument. He would challenge an examination of all the records of diplomacy, not excepting even those in the most haughty period of imperial Rome, when she was carrying her arms into the barbarian nations that surrounded her, and he did not believe a solitary instance could be found of such an inexorable spirit of domination

pervading a compact purporting to be a treaty of peace. It consisted of the most severe and humiliating demands-of the surrender of a large territory-of the privilege of making roads through the remnant which was retained-of the right of establishing trading houses-of the obligation of delivering into our hands their prophets. And all this of a wretched people reduced to the last extremity of distress, whose miserable existence we had to preserve by a voluntary stipulation, to furnish them with bread! When did the all-conquering and desolating Rome ever fail to respect the altars and the gods of those whom she subjugated! Let me not be told that these prophets were impostors, who deceived the Indians. They were their prophets-the Indians believed and venerated them, and it is not for us to dictate a religious belief to them. It does not belong to the holy character of the religion which we profess, to carry its precepts, by the force of the bayonet, into the bosoms of other people. Mild and gentle persuasion was the great instrument employed by the meek Founder of our religion. We leave to the humane and benevolent efforts of the reverend professors of Christianity to convert from barbarism those unhappy nations yet immersed in its gloom. But, sir, spare them their prophets! spare their delusions! spare their prejudices and superstitions! spare them even their religion, such as it is, from open and cruel violence. When, sir, was that treaty concluded? On the very day, after the protocol was signed, of the first conference between the American and British commissioners, treating of peace, at Ghent. In the course of that negotiation, pretensions so enormous were set up, by the other party, that, when they were promulgated in this country, there was one general burst of indignation throughout the continent. Faction itself was silenced, and the firm and unanimous determination of all parties was, to fight until the last man fell in the ditch, rather than submit to such ignominious terms. What a contrast is exhibited between the contemporaneous scenes of Ghent and of Fort Jackson! what a powerful voucher would the British commissioners have been furnished with, if they could have got hold of that treaty! The United States demand, the United States demand, is repeated five or six times. And what did the preamble itself disclose? That two-thirds of the Creek nation had been hostile, and onethird only friendly to us. Now he had heard, (he could not vouch for the truth of the statement,) that not one hostile chief signed the treaty. He had also heard that perhaps one or two of them had. If the treaty were really made by a minority of the nation, it was not obligatory upon the whole nation. It was void, considered in the light of a national compact. And, if void, the Indians were entitled to the benefit of the provision of the ninth article of the treaty of Ghent, by which we bound ourselves to make peace with any tribes with whom we might be at war on the ratification of the treaty, and to restore to them their lands, as they held them in 1811. Mr. C. said he did not

know how the honorable Senate, that body for which he held so high a respect, could have given their sanction to the treaty of Fort Jackson, so utterly irreconcileable as it is with those noble principles of generosity and magnanimity which he hoped to see his country always exhibit, and particularly toward the miserable remnant of the Aborigines. It would have comported better with those principles, to have imitated the benovolent policy of the founder of Pennsylvania, and to have given to the Creeks, conquered as they were, even if they had made an unjust war upon us, the trifling consideration, to them an adequate compensation, which he paid for their lands. That treaty, Mr. C. said, he feared, had been the main cause of the recent war. And, if it had been, it only added another melancholy proof to those with which history already abounds, that hard and unconscionable terms, extorted by the power of the sword and the right of conquest, served but to whet and stimulate revenge, and to give to old hostilities, smothered, not extinguished, by the pretended peace, greater exasperation and more ferocity. A truce, thus patched up with an unfortunate people, without the means of existence, without bread, is no real peace. The instant there is the slightest prospect of relief from such harsh and severe conditions, the conquered party will fly to arms, and spend the last drop of blood rather than live in such degraded bondage. Even if you again reduce him to submission, the expenses incurred by this second war, to say nothing of the human lives that are sacrificed, will be greater than what it would have cost you to have granted him liberal conditions in the first instance. This treaty, he repeated it, was, he apprehended, the cause of the war. It led to those excesses on our southern borders which began.it. Who first commenced them, it was perhaps difficult to ascertain. There was, however, a paper on this subject, communicated at the last session by the President, that told, in language pathetic and feeling, an artless tale-a paper that carried such internal evidence, at least, of the belief of the authors of it that they were writing the truth, that he would ask the favor of the committee to allow him to read it.* I should be very un

The following is the letter from ten of the Seminole towns, which Mr. C. read: To the Commanding Officer at Fort Hawkins:

DEAR SIR,

Since the last war, after you sent word that we must quit the war, we, the red people, have come over on this side. The white people have carried all the red people's cattle off. After the war, I sent to all my people to let the white people alone, and stay on this side of the river; and they did so: but the white people still continue to carry off their cattle. Bernard's son was here, and I inquired of him what was to be done and he said we must go to the head man of the white people, and complain. I did so, and there was no head white man, and there was no law in this case. The whites first began, and there is nothing said about that; but great complaint about what the Indians do. This is now three years since the white people killed three Indians-since that they have killed three other Indians, and taken their horses, and what they had; and this summer they killed three more; and very lately they killed one more. We sent word to the white people that these murders were done, and the answer was, that they were people that were outlaws, and we ought to go and kill them. The white people killed our people first; the Indians then took satisfaction. There are yet three men that the red people have never taken satisfaction for. You have wrote that there were houses burnt; but we know of no